Postgraduate research supervision in a socially distributed knowledge system: some thoughts

Abstract

Postgraduate supervision is a higher education practice with a long history. Through the conventional "apprenticeship" model postgraduate supervision has served as an important vehicle of intellectual inheritance between generations. However, this model of supervision has come under scrutiny as a consequence of the massification of higher education as well as shifts in the way knowledge is produced and disseminated in contemporary society. In this article we discuss different models of postgraduate supervision and suggest that a new model of supervision might be emerging as we move towards a more socially distributed knowledge system. In such a model, those involved in the supervision process would include partners other than university lecturers and student-peers.

South African Journal of Higher Education Vol.16(3) 2002: 50-57